The ‘Everyone’s Complaint Department’ series of comic strips began as random doodles and reflection pieces of Alvin Teoh, ECD of Naga DDB Tribal. These little stories featured in MARKETING magazine were originally posted on Facebook and are an ongoing tribute to life in Adland.
The comic depicts Alvin’s early days in the advertising industry and words from the Executive Creative Director(ECD) himself.
I was losing my temper three times a day on average. I was a junior art director that perhaps thought the universe revolved around me. I was incredibly passionate about my work and had trouble understanding why it was seldom sold. So the only reaction to rejected work was to destroy chairs, tables, cubical walls and take it out on Account Management.”
Therein lies the problem: it was all about my ideas. And that was both naive and arrogant. Well, things changed pretty quickly. After the early years of living in a self-delusional bubble of self-adoration, I had to go sell my own shit and as a Junior Art Director, I had to face Directors of Marketing and CEOs.
I was torn to bits as they took my ego and wiped their asses with it. You can say it was a life-changing experience, haha. And these sorts of experiences were among the best ones in my career.
So after having humble pie shoved forcefully into the pit of my belly, I quickly learned a new lesson: definitely, your creative ideas are basically shit if it doesn’t solve a problem that matters to the client.
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